William Lloyd Garrison (1805–79) was an American editor, reformer, and antislavery crusader. He was the foremost white radical abolitionist and critic of the racial prejudice of the antebellum era (before the American Civil War.)
Born in Newburyport, Massachusetts, Garrison was mostly self-educated and held several apprenticeships, including one to a printer. He became editor of the Newburyport Herald (1824) and the National Philanthropist (1828.) In his editorials, he condemned slavery so vigorously that he was imprisoned.
Garrison was founder-editor of The Liberator (1831–65,) which argued for immediate abolition and demanded complete emancipation of the slaves. The Liberatorestablished itself as the most influential of a growing number of anti-slavery periodicals. Garrison was jailed for calling a slave trader a murderer.
Garrison visited Great Britain on lecture tours, and, in 1833, founded the American Anti-Slavery Society. In spite of his pacifism, he supported the Union in the Civil War and actively championed President Abraham Lincoln’s policies abolishing slavery.
After the Civil War and the abolition of slavery, Garrison turned his crusading attention to temperance, women’s suffrage, and the plight of the Native American peoples.
Garrison’s books include Thoughts on African Colonization (1832,) Sonnets (1843,) and Selections (1852) from his speeches and writings.
More: Wikipedia • READ: Works by William Lloyd Garrison
In proportion as we perceive and embrace the truth do we become just, heroic, magnanimous, divine.
—William Lloyd Garrison
Topics: Truth
The apathy of the people is enough to make every statue leap from its pedestal and hasten the resurrection of the dead.
—William Lloyd Garrison
Topics: Apathy
I am in earnest; I will not equivocate; I will not excuse; I will not retreat a single inch; and I will be heard.
—William Lloyd Garrison
Topics: Dedication, Commitment, Respect, Respectability
With reasonable men, I will reason; with humane men I will plead; but to tyrants I will give no quarter, nor waste arguments where they will certainly be lost.
—William Lloyd Garrison
Topics: Arguments
Are right and wrong convertible terms, dependant upon popular opinion?
—William Lloyd Garrison
Topics: Integrity
My country is the world; my countrymen are mankind.
—William Lloyd Garrison
Topics: Country, Patriotism
Little boldness is needed to assail the opinions and practices of notoriously wicked men; but to rebuke great and good men for their conduct, and to impeach their discernment, is the highest effort of moral courage.
—William Lloyd Garrison
Topics: Integrity
Tell a man whose house is on fire to give a moderate alarm; tell him to moderately rescue his wife from the hands of the ravisher; tell the mother to gradually extricate her babe from the fire into which it has fallen; but urge me not to use moderation in a case like the present.
—William Lloyd Garrison
Topics: Moderation
We may be personally defeated, but our principles never.
—William Lloyd Garrison
Topics: Principles
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